


No, Really

by nausicaa_lives



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Coming Out, Ensemble Cast, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 15:55:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29281050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nausicaa_lives/pseuds/nausicaa_lives
Summary: Will everyone stop trying to set him up with George Weasley, please?
Relationships: Harry Potter/George Weasley
Comments: 3
Kudos: 93
Collections: Chocolate Box - Round 6





	No, Really

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Othalla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Othalla/gifts).



_Wednesday, August 2, 2000_

“Have you thought about getting back with Ginny? Dean’s circling again you know, the vulture.” It's getting late. The take out cartons from the Chinese place on 6th have been cleaned out and stacked, and Harry, Ron, and Hermione have found their way to the rug in front of the fireplace. All plied with warmth and wine, with his two closest friends beside him, moments like this are usually when Harry feels calmest and most comfortable. Tonight, however, Harry feels very tense. 

“Ron, Ginny is not a carcass for men to eat.” 

“I wasn’t saying that, when was I saying she was a carcass?”

“Just now, do you even listen to yourself speak or is that too much for your attention span?”

“‘Mione, I was just saying that—”

“Guys,” Harry cuts in. Their arguing can be soothing, but not when he’s waiting to tell them something. Only, now their heads have swiveled and their eyes have focused in on him like homing devices, and Harry doesn’t want to say anything. “First of all,” he stalls, just a bit, “I spoke to Ginny this morning and she and Dean are officially together so you might want to stop calling him a bird of prey.”

“See 'Mione, they wouldn’t be birds of prey if they only ate carc—wait, they’re what?!” Ron exclaims. 

“Good for them,” Hermione says, taking a sip of wine.

“Hold on,” Ron says, waving his arm about in a way that indicates just how many sips of wine _he’s_ taken. “Why’s she told you this! I’m her flesh and blood, and I only know about the circling bugger because I’ve caught him there when I drop in at her flat uninvited.”

Harry meets Hermione’s eyes before she rolls them violently and sighs.

“Ron,” she begins,

“I know, I know, I’m trying to be better, just.” Ron stands up abruptly. “I’m off to the loo. I’ve got to recalibrate. My only sister is dating Dean Thomas, _respected_ ,” he continues as he walks down the hall, “respected schoolmate and standup guy, not a weird, predatory bugger hanging around her flat at 9 PM on a….”

“He should be back in a moment,” Hermione says, turning back toward Harry after watching him disappear into the bathroom door. “To his credit, he really is getting better.”

“Yeah,” Harry huffs a laugh, “I can tell.”

“Really!” Hermione insists and laughs back and him. "You know, it's hard to unlearn old patterns, but he is trying."

"Yeah," Harry says. Their voices settle and they occupy a slow, tipsy silence for a moment that feels long. Harry plays with the fringe of his rug and wonders why things can’t feel this simple all the time.

“Harry,” Hermione says. “Was there something else you wanted to say?” Oh god. Her warm brown eyes are looking at his so kindly, and he's hit with a shock that she _knows_ , and then a release, _of course she knows_ , and it seems to be _okay_ , and he's hot with relief and embarrassment that she's so perceptive. 

“Harry,” she repeats. “It’ll be alright.”

“Will it?” He asks.

“Yes.”

Ron emerges at last and sits back down on the rug next to Hermione.

“I think I handled that rather well actually,” he says.

“Sure Ron,” says Harry.

“I decided to invite Dean to Sunday lunch in there just now,” he continues, looking awfully proud of himself.

“That’s good. Maybe we ought to wait for Ginny to invite him herself,” Hermione says. “You know, when she’s ready?”

“Right, right,” Ron says gruffly. “Right, good idea.” Harry feels warm inside looking at Ron and Hermione, who are now looking at each other in a way that made him feel excluded when he was sixteen and now just makes him feel nostalgic and safe.

“The thing is Ron,” Harry says, “I’m actually not really into girls at all.” He waits for his words to hang uncomfortably in the air, but the moment is truncated as Ron replies right away. 

“I know mate, the hassle frankly seems not worth it half the time—I was talking about dating, not you ‘Mione, anyway, that’s the point, right, you just need to find the right one.” Normally Harry would congratulate Ron on an excellent recovery there, laugh with Hermione as he got redder and talked faster, but his stomach is too tight, and he just needs to get this over with.

“it’s not that. I don’t really prefer girls. If you know what I mean.”

“You don’t—OH. Do you mean you prefer, er, not-girls?”

“Not-girls as in men, Ronald?” Hermione laughs at him, thank god for her.

“Gee, men sounds really scary, very grown up. I was thinking like, boys, you know, or uhm, "blokes" ” Ron says. 

“Yes,” Harry says. “Er, either. I’m, ehm. A bit gay.”

“Just a bit?” Ron follows up quickly, and oh no, Harry’s got to nip that in the bud.

“Quite gay. Really, you know, thoroughly.”

“Hmmmm…” says Ron.

"In a way that will not change," Harry says, just to drive that home.

“You know,” Ron says before pausing again, and Harry feels himself stiffen. He doesn’t think Ron will say anything abjectly horrible, but he might, or he might suggest that Harry just hadn’t found the right girl, or he might ask if Harry had ever thought of _him_ that way, or, or—“George is into blokes. You should’ve said earlier, so we could fix that up.”  
 _What?!_

As he processes Ron's words, it’s like everything in Harry’s body loosens and lightens all at once. He lets out a laugh that sounds a little crazed because it’s all relief, all _Thank Merlin, Thank Merlin it’s alright afterall._ And maybe a little surprise, because he really didn’t know that about George, and if he had he would've approached this whole thing with a lot less apprehension. 

“No, mate, it’s really not necessary—” he tries, but to no avail. 

“Well but he and Ginny are quite alike really,” Hermione's mouth twitches wildly in a way that Harry knows from experience suggests she's trying her utmost not to burst into giggles. "Excepting that he's not a girl. And he's ginger too, so if you've got a thing for that...." Hermione, now that the mood has lightened and the tension has passed, flops down on her back and gives up trying not to laugh completely.

_Sunday, August 6, 2000_

"I hear," begins Percy, and Harry resigns himself to listening to the latest news on domestic portkey regulation, "that you might, ehm, swing the other way, as it were." Oh God. Harry doesn't know if this is better or worse. At the very least, it probably means he'll be able to excuse himself from the conversation earlier. As the silence goes on, it becomes clear Percy wants Harry to respond before going on. 

"Yep," Harry says flatly. He doesn't have to make it _easy_ for people to ask him strange questions about his personal life, surely. 

"Well, I don't know if you knew this, but George also swings in that….. _particular_ direction, if you catch my drift Harry," he looks at Harry significantly. Harry's afraid that in another moment he might actually wink. 

"Oh yes, I catch it," Harry responds.

"Right," Percy continues on briskly, "So I was wondering if it might be a nice idea for you to… _swing_ by the shop sometime, maybe keep him some _company_ during the less busy hours of the day, if you see where I'm—"

"I see where you're going, Perce." Harry says. The significant look is back again, good grief. "I um… I just—alright," he utters, then turns on his heel and exits out the door to the garden, though not quickly enough that he misses Audrey whisper, quite loudly and in a very insistent high pitch,

"Did you bring it up?" and Percy answer,

"Yes dear, but you know Harry, he's just so stubborn."

_Sunday, August 13, 2000_

The thing is, thinks Harry, after the second Sunday brunch at the Weasleys since his sexuality became common family knowledge, it was all good and well that first time with Ron, and but at this point, it's interfering with things! He couldn't ask George to pass the salt without Bill looking at him and giving the very obvious wink he'd been fearing, and Charlie kept kicking him under the table and then grinning in a way Harry was sure _he_ thought was very friendly but in truth made Harry's calf a bit sore. Together they'd made Percy's awkward approach look downright tactful. George, at least, has seemed oblivious to his family's machinations, and thank God for that. It's a little strange, actually, because normally Fred and George are like bloodhounds when it comes to sniffing out points of embarrassment and potential mockery, but now Fred is dead and George keeps to himself more, and even three years on it feels distinctly abnormal. It's not that he's grim or quiet all the time or anything—Harry imagines that to anyone who didn't know him before, George still seems like a remarkably genial, outgoing, and funny sort of character. It's only to the people who really knew him that it's visible that some bright light within him has dimmed.

All that to say that Harry's really, terrifically glad that George has not been made aware of this total, utter nonsense, even if the fact that he hasn't picked up on it himself is itself a bit odd and sad, but everyone has scars and unfading bruises nowadays so. Better not to think about any too much really. That should be his approach to this whole thing, he resolves. He's just got to put it out of his mind because last week when Ron conned him into going to WW's over their lunch break (" _really_ good sandwich place, Harry, you've got to try them …. oh let's stop in on George since we're right next door anyway!") he'd acted so weird in his attempts to act normal that George had offered him the PepperUp he kept behind the counter.

_Saturday, August 19, 2000_

Ignoring something that everyone keeps shoving down your throat turns out to be quite difficult. "Harry," Arthur Weasley says when Molly's made Ron go and degnome the garden with Charlie, leaving Harry alone with him in the shed. "George's patronus is a black bear, you know."

"Is it," Harry says, continuing to screw in the wheel on a rollerblade with the small allen wrench in his hand. "Is that a family thing?"

"Oh, um, not that I know of, Harry," Arthur says, sounding a bit stilted. "I just um—I was on the Macintosh the other day and I read some things about how in the, ah, homosexual community, many people desire these bear-types, and you know," he gives Harry a smile, looking very proud of himself.

Harry is utterly speechless.

"I wanted to see if there was anything about stag-types, but I couldn't find anything! These muggles, it just fascinates me what they choose to focus on. And how do they know what sort of type they are if they can't cast patronuses I wonder? Do they just have a sense about it, Harry? Very impressive of them, I'd say."

"I…. yeah…." Harry says, looking around the shed for anything, _anything_ that will get him cleanly out of this conversation. "I'm not really dating at the moment. I just have a lot to do getting ready for next term, lessons to plan, you know…"  
"Oh of course, Harry," Arthur continues. "You know that we're all very proud of the work you're doing off at Hogwarts. It's very important stuff, rebuilding for the next generation of witches and wizards. We wouldn't want you to get too distracted, and George is in no rush either." He looks at Harry kindly, and Harry remembers that he is so, so lucky to have these people in his life who are trying so hard to help make him happy. He feels guilty for being embarrassed about Arthur fussing over him, but also feels glad for it, because that's what Ginny and Ron and everyone else do when they're fussed over, that's what real family is like. He can't remember being bashful like this around the Dursleys once, only humiliated and angry and afraid, which were so different.

"Thank you, though, Arthur," he says, his voice thick. "I really appreciate it." And maybe he'll have to deal with more remarks about George's patronus on his Saturdays in the shed going forward, but as Arthur wraps him in a hug that smells of wood chips and geraniums, he doesn't mind it.

_Sunday, August 20, 2000_

"Stupid, really," Harry hears a low voice behind him as he's washing out the bunt pan the next day. Molly's off yelling at Ron and Ginny for doing dangerous things on brooms in the backyard and he'd settled into a bit of soapy calm. Now, he turns to see George coming up behind him. 

"What?" Harry says, stupidly, wondering if he'd missed something. 

"All _this_ ," George waves his hand about. "You'd think they'd never heard of gay people before. Do they think we just pair off as soon as there's another poof in our midst?" Harry thinks that word's a bit offensive, but he supposes George has been doing this for longer and so he probably knows what's what, and doesn't say anything. Then he really processes what George has said and starts.

"Merlin, have you known this whole time what they've been trying to do?!" He exclaims, feeling a rush of blood flood his face and overheat him. 

"Well, they haven't exactly been subtle, have they Harry?" George says. "Mum _actually_ tripped you into me this morning." Harry had been trying to tell himself that this had been an accident, and was mortified to find what he had suspected all along confirmed. He was mortified at all of it, actually.

"I um, I didn't ask them to do this, you know," he says. 

"Don't worry, I know, you think I haven't been getting this too? 'Oh George, doesn't that jumper make Harry look just so dashing, oh George, you're so successful, you ought not to be intimidated by people you might want to date who are very famous and accomplished.' Which, you know, coming from my own Mum did feel a bit backhanded, I have to say. Anyway, you needn't worry, I'm not taking it seriously. They're just trying to pair us off, as I said. I have about the same likelihood of dating you as I do of dating Marcus Flint."

"Oh, is he, er—"

"Yes, he's gay too, didn't you hear? He's with Ernie now." This is quite a lot of new information at once. Despite himself, Harry finds himself returning to—

"Wait a second the same likelihood? Marcus Flint is a prat!" George just laughs. "No really, I'm just saying, you know, if we _were_ thinking about the odds, hypothetically, that like... I should be above Flint, at the very least. And Ernie too, if he's in the mix, I think he's a bit boring."

"Oh yeah," George asks, not laughing anymore but smiling and raising an eyebrow. "Anyone else?"

"Well," Harry feels quite self conscious now, but then, "now that you mention it, I've heard some rumors about Malfoy, and if they're true I think it's only fair that I rate above him, you know, because he was really no good."

"Ah," George says. "Right. And I definitely want to end up with someone good."

"Well," Harry says again. "Yeah," he finishes lamely. George just gives him another soft grin before he turns and exits to the backyard. As he gets back to scrubbing, Harry can hear him heckling Ron to do a third loop without sicking himself this time, if he can, and he squirms.

Merlin, he can't be attracted to George Weasley, not after all of this. It really is the most embarrassing turn of events yet. 

_Wednesday, July 11, 2001_

"Didn't I tell you? Didn't I tell you?" Ron is drunk again and has picked up a familiar vein of conversation.

"Ron, he was the only other bloke you knew who liked dick, it really doesn't count," George says.

"I've learned to just give in," Harry says, rolling his eyes but smiling a George and Ron despite himself. "Yes, Ron, very good of you. This was your plan all along and we were mere pawns acting—"

"Well maybe not a plan, but like… oh pawns, chess, _yes_ , a scheme, maybe what do you think 'Mione, a scheme then?"

"Oh yes, very good scheme, Ronald," Hermione babies Ron while rubbing his back.

"If I get drunk and start acting like an idiot, will you rub _me_ and talk to _me_ in the voice you use for little pug dogs, Harry?" George asks him.

"No," Harry says instantly, grinning.

"Yes you will," George says.

"Oh yeah?" Harry asks, tilting his head closer, looking in George's eyes and then down at his lips.

"Yeah," George says, his tongue darting out along his bottom lip. "Because if you don't who knows what I'll be too drunk to keep from saying about you. All your dirty secrets."

"All of them?"

"Well, some of them,"

"Well, if you'll blackmail me,"

"Yeah," George says, "I will," and presses his lips to Harry's before Harry can say anything else.


End file.
